Archives: June 2009

Will the Republicans or the Democrats be the 'Party of Growth'?

Posted by: Michael Mandel on June 30, Categories: Political Economy

Amity Shlaes has a very interesting commentary on Bloomberg. Shlaes responds to the Sanford scandal this way: ...instead of blowing up their marriages, Republicans might try blowing up their party...

Immelt Speech: U.S. Companies Begin to Realize Their Mistake

Posted by: Michael Mandel on June 27, Categories: Trade

I'm going to make a forecast: Over the next couple of years, U.S-based companies will begin to realize that they made a big mistake relying so heavily on off-shoring. Ironically--or...

A Short Job Quiz

Posted by: Michael Mandel on June 25, Categories: Labor Market

Here's a three-part quiz about jobs. Answers and a bonus question at the bottom (don't peek!). 1. Which of the following manufacturing industries has lost more jobs since 1998? a)...

A Lost Decade for Jobs

Posted by: Michael Mandel on June 23, Categories: Labor Market

Private sector job growth was almost non-existent over the past ten years. Take a look at this horrifying chart: Between May 1999 and May 2009, employment in the private sector...

Why the Financial Regulation Proposal is Unsatisfying

Posted by: Michael Mandel on June 19, Categories: Financial markets

Wall Street's embrace of foreign markets makes it nearly impossible for national regulators to keep watch over what's being sold abroad and to whom. This sentence comes from one...

Tracking Hedge Funds (Where's Waldo?)

Posted by: Michael Mandel on June 19, Categories: Financial markets

In the popular children's book series Where's Waldo?, you look at complicated cartoons and try to find the little character Waldo. For years (literally!) I've engaged in a variant of...

Which Educated Workers Are Unemployed?

Posted by: Michael Mandel on June 15, Categories: Labor Market

I've been watching the unemployment rate for college-educated workers rise from 2.3% a year ago, to 4.8% in May. But even that figure, I think, understates the pain in much...

The "Lost Decade" for Venture Capital

Posted by: Michael Mandel on June 10, Categories: Innovation

Paul Kedrosky just did a new report for the Kauffman Foundation entitled "Right-Sizing the U.S. Venture Capital Industry." Paul's main point--the VC industry needs to shrink to match the pool...

Innovation Shortfall and Hiring

Posted by: Michael Mandel on June 09, Categories: Labor Market

On the New York Times Economix blog, David Leonhardt brings up another implication of the innovation shortfall: The reason that job growth was mediocre in the 2000s and that job...

Manufacturing Growth: Much Worse than We Thought

Posted by: Michael Mandel on June 05, Categories: Manufacturing

According to the official statistics from the BEA, real manufacturing output, or value-added, grew at a 2.6% annual rate between 1998 and 2007. That's barely a hair below the 2.7%...

Innovation, Interrupted

Posted by: Michael Mandel on June 04, Categories: Innovation

Try this: "We live in an era of rapid innovation." I'm sure you've heard that phrase, or some variant, over and over again. The evidence appears to be all around...